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Chinese women win two golds at Asian Wrestling Championships
The Associated PressPublished: May 11, 2007
BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan: Senlian Yang and Meng Chen won gold medals for China in the women's freestyle events at the Asian Wrestling Championships Friday.
Yang beat Dorj Narmandakh of Mongolia 1-1, 7-0, 3-0 in the 59-kilogram class to claim her first major title, while Chen defeated Daria Karpenko of Kazakhstan 4-2, 3-2 in the 67-kilogram category.
In the 55-kilogram division, Jyldyz Ashimova-Turkbaeva of Kazakhstan rallied to beat Mizuho Shibata of Japan 0-1, 1-0, 1-0 to win her first title.
China won three of seven freestyle events in two days, one more then Japan.
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Yoshida, Hamaguchi victorious at Asian championships
Friday, May 11, 2007 at 06:57 EDT
BISHKEK — Saori Yoshida and fellow Japanese Olympic medalist Kyoko Hamaguchi both won their third titles at the Asian wrestling championships on Thursday.
Yoshida notched a pair of wins by fall in the Kyrgyzstan capital on her way to the women's 55-kilogram final. She beat 2005 world silver medalist Su Lihui of China 2-0 to stretch her winning streak to 109 matches. Hamaguchi upended Chinese archrival and reigning Olympic champion Wang Xu 2-1 in their semifinal before edging Kazak wrestler Olga Zhanibekova by the same scoreline in the final.
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I want to have the best wrestlers at the All Africa Games — Igali
By Solomon Nwoke
Posted to the Web: Saturday, May 12, 2007
Nigeria’s gift to Canada in wrestling, Daniel The Dynamite Igali was recently appointed as the technical adviser to the national team preparing for the All Africa Games in Algiers in July. In this interview, he talks about the team’s readiness for the medals chase and other matters. Excerpts:
Welcome Daniel Igali, let me start by congratulating you on your appointment as the Technical Adviser of the Nigeria Amateur Wrestling Federation (NAWF)
Thank you very much
Now, let’s know how it makes you feel
Well, I feel elated, I think it’s a feather on the cap most importantly because it’s where I started from and everyone has the tendency to want to come back to their roots and having been given that opportunity, I am very thankful.
Can you let us into what the contract is like?
It’s not a formal contract per se. It is to last till the end of the All Africa Games in Algeria because I took a leave of absence from where I was working in Canada to come down here and until something is solid enough for me to say no to the job I already have over there, I will still hang on to the fact that my duty will finish after the All Africa Games in July.
So how’s the team spirit of the wrestlers in camp now after your first three months exercise?
We finished our first phase of the camp on February 28and we went back home for about a month before we all came back for this competition, the 3rd Gov Sam Egwu Wrestling Championship in Abakaliki here. Well, it’s been great, the team spirit is quite high. If the medals were to be won based on zeal alone, I think we’ll have as many medals as we can because the coaches in camp are very dedicated and the athletes are super motivated to perform.
To what extent are the wrestlers appreciative of your presence in the camp?
It’s mutual respect I think, and I don’t want to think that anything is going to change because of my presence. I think what matters is the world view these wrestlers have, what matters is the fact that they want the same thing as I do, which is to do well. I made it clear to everyone that my interest is not necessarily medals right now, my interest is to see 100 percent effort and that’s what I asked from all of them . Whoever gives me a 100 percent record, I think I will then worry about the medals later.
Still on your contract, who picks the bill, the Nigeria Amateur Wrestling Federation (NAWF) or the National Sports Commission (NSC) and how much is the contract worth?
The National Sports Commission (NSC) picks the bills , but it’s not the contract per se , it’s more of a voluntary service. My expenses (bills) are taken care of by the NSC. So I don’t want to really call it a contract, it’s not a contract.
So no money is attached to it ?
Well they obviously have to pay for my expenses here and I think that’s all that it entails because I am not at liberty to go into details.
Since you wouldn’t let us know the details, how are you facing the challenges in camp if any?
No , I don’t know if I want to call them challenges. I don’t want to call them challenges, I think we have some growing pains. You know athletes used to train in a certain way and they are coming up with some different programmes, the muscles have gotten used to some of the tasks imposed on them. I think that’s the phase we are in right now.
If I have any concern it’s the fact that I have to teach them how to adapt because my style is a bit more offensive and I believe that I want to have the best conditioned athletes in Algiers among the African teams. To achieve that, I have to ask a lot from them. I think that will be for a while, we’ll over come it.
So how are you coping with the old guards in the camp, talking about the former coaches who were handling the team. How’s your relationship with them?
I have a very good relationship with all the coaches and the technical officials that are in camp.
They are for the most part, my bigger brothers, even like fathers to me when I started. I still give them that respect, I call everybody Sir, Coach this and Coach that. We have a very cordial relationship. I respect them for what they bring and I think there’s that mutual respect from them as well for what I bring and I’m quite appreciative of that.
What do think is the problem of wrestling in Nigeria compared to those of the outer world ?
I think our biggest handicap is the fact that we don’t have enough competitions yearly. Competition is the biggest bane of Nigerian wrestlers. We have just had one now, the Gov Sam Egwu National Wrestling Championship hosted annually for the past three years.
Other than that, we wait for the National Sports Festival, so we wait till the festival year before we have a competition. Outside that, we just have one competition. One thing we need to rectify, it’s to look for more sponsors, ones that will be associated with wrestling
The 3rd Gov Sam Egwu Wrestling Championship was recently concluded. What’s your appraisal of the athletes’ performance in that competition?
I think the level of performance was quite high because there were lots of upsets. I was thrown completely off balance. I have to go back to the drawing board. Out of the seven national champions in female wrestling, six of them were beaten, only one retained her title. So, we now have to have our trials again to determine who’ll win. Whoever wins, will make the (All Africa Games) team.
I think I’m just jittery because I did not have some people in camp that I can watch over and over again for a while to see what they can do. Now I have new set of people and I don’t know what to expect. That’s a little issue though but a big test for me. I’ve got to bring as many tricks out of my heart to make the best decision for the team.
In Greco Roman with seven weight classes, three were beaten in a couple of weight classes. It’s not too surprising, but at a point I was quite surprised by one because I thought he was the best. I think he’s still the best out of them . I wouldn’t want to mention his name here. Also in the freestyle, four champions were beaten. That again, was quite a surprise.
They have to fight for their spot, but I want to think it is because of the level of competition. I also want to think that this will wake them to train harder and get back to the team because right now I don’t have a team.
I will get a team in two weeks but that will not be my definitive team. My team will be ready after the training tour of Cuba.
Even in the African Wrestling Championship, if I go with you and you don’t give me 100 percent, then you have made my job easier because I have another person who can go. And that puts me in a pretty comfortable position.
Now put the old and the new champions together, can you say we have wrestlers who can bring home all the gold medals from Algeria?
We have 51 countries going to the Games going after the 21 gold medals, so if you want to go by the ration 51 to 21, if we can win one gold medal, we have done very well. That’s if you want to share it by the countries.
We intend to select a group of kids that will go there, kids that will be hungry to compete. We intend to get the fittest kids on the team, we intend to ensure that the people that will go are the best that will compete for Nigeria. I think that’s all I want from the team. That’s what I have as my number one priority, to ensure that we have the best team representing Nigeria at the All Africa Games.
Talking about drugs, do you entertain fears that one of your wrestlers might be caught for that?
It’s always very tempting when people tell you that there’s a short-cut to performance. And the biggest concern that I have is not the athletes themselves but our doping agencies in Nigeria.
They virtually do nothing. I have been in camp for three months, not even one of the athletes were tested in three months I was in a situation in an Olympic year, I was tested six times that year. There are certain times I was tested three times in a month and when an athlete knows that throughout the year he may not be tested, then he will be tempted to use performance enhancing drugs. And I want to send a message to the doping agencies to step up their act because they’ve been sleeping.
How is the second phase of the camping going to be like considering the kind of upsets recorded in this competition.
The second phase will be a mixture of past and current champions. I will be inviting two athletes to camp for each weight category. What it will entail is the best two in each weight class being invited to camp and that’s why I introduced the wrestling of the number two and the third persons.
This is in order to know the true number two because in the past the silver and bronze medalists never meet in a competition. Sometimes a silver medalist loses to a bronze medalist and gold medalist loses to a bronze medalist and so on.
But sometimes, a bronze medalist is even better than a gold or silver medalist. So what we did in this competition is to pair the silver and bronze medalists to have the true number two.
Is there any plan to invite foreign based wrestlers to camp?
I do not have very many. I have Sunday Opiah who’s based in London and competes for Lagos State, he’ll be in camp. I will give him opportunity to be in camp. I have a couple of athletes in the US I am monitoring, I won’t be able to give a progress report on them now till the end of the college season. They are Nigerians born there, I have been in contact with them.
I won’t be at liberty to give their names away yet because I haven’t got their permission I’m still in the process of convincing them to compete for Nigeria. They feel they are American citizens so far they have not made up their mind. They’re pretty young kids of about 20 and 21 in 85kg and 95 kg weight classes. They might be good in free style wrestling, if not now they could be useful in the future.
Now that you’re handling the National Wrestling team to the All Africa Games and perhaps to the Olympics as the case may be, what happens to the Maureen Matherny Academy, your wrestling academy?
Maureen Matherny Academy is still there, I am still keeping a watchful eye over the academy. I’m still looking for an approval from the governor of Bayelsa State who has promised to be an equal partner of the project and he has been very magnanimous. I have personally gone to the academy to inspect it and I am quite hopeful that before he (the Governor of Bayelsa State) leaves office, he is going to make a substantial approval for the second phase of construction.
I hope to be in business by September. Maureen Matherny will take off in September, all things being equal. So it’s still in good hands. I have a group of people that are looking over it and I am hopeful that when this approval comes, it’s going to be even better.
How many students, if I may ask, have you recruited?
I haven’t recruited any student but we are going to recruit 90 students in the first year and 60 students after every year. Our plan is not to have more than 30 students in a class, that’s the plan. We don’t want the class to be over crowded, we want to give individual attention to students. So we are going to ensure that we have the best of students in academics and sports.
Since you have not recruited, what’s keeping you back?
We planned to start the second phase before we recruit students, so we are hoping that in late June or July our admission forms will be out for students to start purchasing and getting recruited into the school.
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Nigerian wrestlers prepare for All Africa Games
5/12/07
Forty five wrestlers have resumed camping in Abakaliki, southern Ebonyi State for the second phase camping of the 9th All Africa Games scheduled for July 11 to July 23 in Algiers.
The Secretary of the Nigeria Wrestling Federation (NWF) Yemi Usikaye said on Friday that the wrestlers responded to the directive by the National Sports Commission(NSC) and resumed camp on Wednesday for training.
"The wrestlers in all the three categories, namely, Greco-Roman, freee style and female events, have resumed camp and would be in camp till their departure for Algiers in July for the games," Usikaye said.
Usikaye said the wrestlers were enthusiastic about the All Africa Games and were doing everything to ensure that they sweep all the medals at stake at the competition, saying "it is either now or never for Nigeria to take her pride of place in continental wrestling."